New Student
by steamfan
Summary: TV Verse. Anna has a little surprise for her mother.
1. Chapter 1

Prologue

Prologue

Chang was furious. 'How could those short sighted fools do this?! By binding Hrothbert of Bainbridge to his dead wife's skull, even if they told him it was his own, they also bound the lady to this plane and earth as well. They would say that it didn't matter as there was little they could do to release her in any case. Bird brained idiots! They should have used his skull. If the damned sorcerer didn't even know that it was his wife's skull there was no point!' The disguised dragon paced the confines of his workshop/cave. He could see the skull of Hrothbert sitting on his work table and the spirit of Winifred of Bainbridge hovering close by. 'There has to be some way to free the lady! She is innocent in all of this!'

Chang paced for the rest of the day before coming to the conclusion that he would have to ask his ancestors for help in this matter. The ritual wasn't one the dragon usually used, but this was a special case. While the dragon was well versed in the use of magic and had won himself a place on the High Council of Wizards in his adopted country, he was not so proud that he was unable to ask for help, especially in a case like this. The dragon knelt in front of a small altar and lit the incense that sat on a small plate. The plate sat in front of a carved figure of a dragon, one that to him represented his ancestors. Chang sent out his plea for guidance and waited. It didn't take long. In fact, it was as though his ancestors had only been waiting for him to ask. That was something that was entirely possible, he admitted to himself.

A voice rose from everywhere and nowhere at once.

When a tainted line brings forth a white knight,

The black soul shall repent,

And redeem himself for the sake of the knight,

Only then shall lovers be reunited in death.

From eldest daughter to eldest daughter,

This trust shall be given,

As one is guarded,

So must the other be.

Chang waited but the voice said nothing more and the incense burned out in a rush. He would have to meditate on his answer for some time to come, although for the ancestors this was a fairly straight forward command. /As one is guarded, So must the other be./ was the easiest part of the prophecy to understand. He would have to bind the lady to her love's skull as he was bound to hers. It was a good thing that he was there for the original binding. This was going to take a great deal of time and effort but it would have taken far longer if he hadn't been there for Bainbridge's sentencing.

For the High Council called the binding that they had done to Bainbridge's spirit to be guarding the sorcerer so that he could not be set free to loose his evil upon the world again. Stupid fools, all it meant was that all of his knowledge was accessible to those who would fight over it. Bainbridge was bound to serve those who owned his lady's skull. That meant that eventually, if not sooner, the sorcerer would fall into the hands of those not quite as evil as the sorcerer had been but who wished to be.

Chapter 1

WINIFRED'S LINE

Two years later Chang handed over a rune scribed skull to a young woman. She was a witch, capable of little more than the modest magic of healing the villagers who tolerated her presence, but she was also his eldest daughter. In fact, Margaret, daughter of Mary, had been conceived only because to not bed the woman his host had given him to warm his bed would have meant a grievous insult, one that he could not have afforded to make at the time. Although she was half dragon, the only inheritance she had received from her father was her ability for magic.

Daughters, especially those born out of wedlock, had never mattered much to humans but Margaret was half dragon and had a special place in Chang's heart as his only daughter. He had demanded that she be turned over to him when she was five years old on his occasion of revisiting the lord's castle where her mother was one of the castle servants. When he left there, he had taken her with him. He had placed her with a foster family who had known better than to mistreat her. She had grown up in the nearby village and had eventually married a local woodsman, one who wasn't afraid of her and her magic or her father.

Margaret carefully checked over the skull. She had been instructed on what to expect but in truth, she had expected to feel far more intimidated by the curses etched onto the skull. But that wasn't the case, instead she felt warm and comfortable holding it. "Winifred of Bainbridge I summon thee," she called. Winifred's ghost came out of the skull in a flash of gold and black, and then transformed into her Human form in front of Margaret.

She was tall for a woman, well over five feet in height with long dark red hair braided all the way to her ankles. Right there and then Margaret knew that she must have been born to a fairly high station. There were few women who could afford to have hair that long and well kept. She herself was one of the few women in the area who even knew how to braid hair or how to fashion a comb to care for the length that such braids required.

Winifred waited patiently. She wasn't sure what to expect from the woman she stood in front of. At the moment she was still very tired and had a vague sense of ache that she knew was the result of her husband's resurrection spell that had pulled her back from the dead. That was the spell that they had both been sentenced to this half life for. For her the worst part of it was that she wasn't as innocent as everyone told her she was.

She had gleefully experimented with Hrothbert to discover new magics and she too had crossed the line into what she had told herself were merely slightly darker ones. Between their explorations and her murder, it was no wonder that her love had gone mad. She knew that time, now that death had her, was the only cure for her pain but only being reunited with Hrothbert would completely ease her broken heart. Chang had told her that it was possible for her to be reunited with her love once more but it would only happen if she remained in the custody of his eldest daughter's line. She had to be passed from eldest daughter to eldest daughter for her to have any chance. It was time to take that first step.

And so it began, from eldest daughter to eldest daughter Winifred of Bainbridge and her husband's skull was passed down through the centuries. At times Winifred despaired over her fate. At other times she had hope as the line of woman guardians had never been broken and she had wonderful children to watch over and teach. That is, until the time came that the newest first born girl child to be born had so little magic in her that it would never manifest in her life. She would only be able to pass the ability on to her own children. Winifred didn't care, it had to happen sooner or later and as long as the line of eldest daughters held true, she would one day be reunited with her Hrothbert. The child's mother on the other hand, was horrified. She was so horrified in fact, that eventually she left her husband and child, taking Winifred with her.

Chapter 2

THE BEGINING OF HROTHBERT'S REDEMPTION

Hrothbert of Bainbridge had never had a student before Harry Dresden was given into his care by his uncle, Justin Morningway. His long line of former masters had wanted to hoard his knowledge and the power that went with it for themselves. Justin Morningway wasn't that much different but he had wanted to ensure that his nephew would follow the darker path to power rather than his parent's idealized path. That was his reason for turning Harry's magical education over to Hrothbert, the cursed ghost who had once been one of the most powerful black sorcerers ever known, that and he didn't have the time or patience to raise a child himself. However, because he only saw Hrothbert as a tool and nothing more, he forgot a basic principal of teaching; that the teacher learns as much as the student.

Hrothbert wasn't simply a tool or a library of magical information. He was a ghost, a spirit of a man, cursed with magical chains that bound him to his skull and to servitude to whoever owned it, and because he was fully aware of his fate, he had the capacity to learn, grow and change if he was given the opportunity. Harry gave him that opportunity. While Hrothbert taught Harry magic, Harry in return taught Hrothbert much of what he had never learned in his mortal life, such as friendship, compassion, the simple pleasure of having comfortable companionship and most importantly the love between a child and parent.

Hrothbert had known a love that was all consuming and the bitter agony of having that love wrenched away from him at the hands of others but he had never known what it was like to simply enjoy the presence of another person. He had never been a father, nor had he known any love for his own. Hrothbert had thrown such things away in his drive to gain more knowledge, more magic and his fall into the black. It was Harry who brought those things into his existence. It was Harry who taught him to see with the eyes of a child. It was no wonder that Hrothbert was far more loyal to Harry than to anyone he had ever served. Harry had returned to the ghost his soul.

Chapter 3

HARRY DRESDEN

Lt. Connie Murphy of the Chicago Police Department is a woman of contrasts. She is only a little taller than average but not by much with a sturdy physique that powers a terrific right hook. I should know. I've seen her deliver it often enough, but there are people out there who would call her delicate or feminine, with her flawless skin, dark eyes and jet black hair. As long as they don't say it to her face, they may survive.

Personally I think she is the most beautiful woman on this Earth and the fact that she's all cop only enhances it. I'm also far too chicken to ever say so. I'd heard her verbally flay her ex-husband alive over the phone once for saying something along those lines. Murphy yells at me often enough for the stupid chances I take when my sense of chivalry takes over. I don't need to add deliberately stupid moves to the list.

I was contemplating these and other things about my angel of law enforcement, (shut up, I know it's a cliché but that is what I see when I look at her with my Sight, besides, I'm not talking out loud here) as I was getting ready for the day when I heard someone enter the front door of my office/workshop/apartment. As I had just gotten out of the shower, this was not necessarily a good thing. I wasn't yet open for business which cut down on who had barged in.

Most evil things couldn't get past my wards and I had no appointments with clients wanting to hire the only wizard in the phone book this early in the morning. That left me with three possibilities, one of which was that something evil had breeched my wards, in which case I had better arm myself with something better than the towels around my waist and neck.

I stretched out my hand and called my wizard's staff to me. Alright it's a hockey stick but you try walking around downtown Chicago these days with any kind of wooden stick over five feet in length and see how far you get. Few people look twice at a guy lugging around a hockey stick for some reason and I am expected to try and keep a low profile. As far as the average person walking down the street is concerned, I'm a P.I. who calls himself a wizard.

Those who know the truth, that I really am a wizard, with magic, ghost mentor and all are the second possibility. Wardens, who are the cops for wizards and others of the magical community, regularly show up at my place threatening to cut my head off. Now why would they do such a thing? Well, first of all they aren't very up on the new invention called due process that governs most of the U.S. today. So, once you've been on trial, even if you get off, they tend to jump to the conclusion that you, or at least me, are behind every little thing that goes wrong in the area.

Oh what had I been on trial for? I self-defensed my late uncle to death, with black magic. He tried to kill me and I succeeded in killing him. I've lived with the guilt ever since. I hadn't meant to kill him, just get the truth out of him. He had already admitted that he had killed my father. I had wanted to know if he had killed my mother as well. I'm still pretty sure that he had.

Uncle Justin was the one who started using magic to do harm. I was just standing there with the evidence that he had killed my father when he began to throw things at me with his magic. If Bob hadn't warned me I would have probably been killed. In the ensuing fight I had eventually fallen on the Voodoo doll that he had used to kill my father as I tried to get out of the way of the table he had thrown at me and in the process crushed my uncle's heart. But Morgan, the head Warden, and his underlings don't take that into account. To them, once you've killed with the black it is only a matter of time before you do it again, even if the first time was by accident.

I had just reached the end of the hallway that led between my living quarters and my office when I heard, "Harry? I need your help!" To my relief, it was neither of the first two possibilities. It was the third, Murphy, and when Murphy barges into my place it generally means that she has a case that she needs my help with. Feeling much better about the situation I hurried into the front room, forgetting my attire or lack thereof. In the middle of my office stood the woman of my dreams and one of my two best friends, holding a little girl in front of her. "Harry!" Murphy scolded me as she hurriedly covered the little girl's eyes. Now I had never met Anna Murphy, Murphy's daughter and only child, but this girl was the very image of her mother and there was no mistaking who she was.

I looked down to see that not only was I dressed in just towels, one was slipping. "Oops! Sorry ladies, I didn't know it wasn't an emergency. Ah, stay right there and I'll be back in just a minute," I promised as I hurried back down the hall. I could hear the giggles following me but I wasn't too worried about it. I'm sure that having a nearly six foot four man wearing only towels and carrying a hockey stick burst into the room was a bit of a funny sight, especially when you're only nine.

Chapter 4

ANNA MURPHY

Anna Murphy, daughter of Lt. Connie Murphy, looked around the wizard's office. Her mom had brought her here after her father had literally dumped her on her mom's doorstep that morning. She didn't want to think of why her father had done that, so she concentrated on snooping. She hadn't known that her mom knew a wizard. Her mom had told her that Mr. Dresden sometimes helped her solve her cases and catch the bad guys. Anna knew that meant that Mr. Dresden was a good wizard, but he sure had a lot of weird and spooky stuff in his office.

She could hear her mother talking to Mr. Dresden. "Harry please! I need a sitter. I can't take Anna down to the station." Anna was glad that her mom wasn't just dropping her off somewhere. She was fine with needing a babysitter, even if she thought that she was too old to have one. That meant that her mom would be coming back for her after work. After what had happened with her father this morning, it was a concern. Would her mom even want her when she found out what had happened?

Mr. Dresden had a ton of paper on his desk and the only one she read was the shopping list, which was a weird mix of normal and magic stuff. He had groceries and car stuff on it and he also had stuff like ant vomit and fish slime. She wasn't sure she wanted to know what else was written on the papers on his desk after that, so she looked at the rest of the things and ignored the papers. There was a bunch of necklaces all jumbled together, a wood drumstick (the kind you used on a drum), a bottle of something floating in green goo and a skull that was covered in symbols carved into the bone.

Anna Murphy was a cop's daughter and granddaughter; she wasn't scared of any old skull. She picked up the skull and began tracing the symbols. "I'm not going to take your money Murphy!" When Anna heard those words, she walked out of the office. She really didn't want to hear that her mom's friend didn't want to baby-sit her. All she had heard for the last few days from her father and step-mother was that she was possessed or worse, that she wasn't wanted and other things that made her want to cry. She wasn't going to cry though. She was going to investigate this old skull and figure out what had killed her.

She slipped out the front door and sat down on the steps that led to the sidewalk. She was close enough to the shop that she wasn't disobeying her mom by taking off but she wasn't able to hear her mom and Mr. Dresden argue either. Anna was running her fingers over the triangle hole in the skull when someone walked up to her. "Heh, this is too easy," the man said. Anna looked up to see a large white man with lots of tattoos covering what she could see of his skin, including two on his face. She screamed as he picked her up and carried her off. She tried to struggle without dropping the skull, (her mom had said that you should never drop evidence) but the man was far too big for her small feet to make much of an impression. This hadn't been on her to do list this morning.

Chapter 5

HARRY DRESDEN

"I'm not going to take your money Murphy!" I said firmly as I tugged on my shoes. The fact that she was the one responsible for my main source of income was completely different in this case. This was a personal request, not hiring me to work a case for the police department. There was no way I'd take money from one of my best friends to baby-sit her daughter for the day. "I do have a client right now but all I'm doing is mixing up some potions for her. I can have that done in about an hour and most of that is just watching to make sure the potions simmer or boil depending on which one I'm making and she isn't coming to pick them up until later on this week. Having Anna around won't be a problem."

"Why not?" Murphy asked. I knew that she knew that I was barely scraping by and didn't have enough money to feed myself some days, but I'm both proud and stubborn, something that Bob has chided me about frequently. I'm sure she was going to push when we heard Anna scream. Instantly we were both running down the hallway and out into my office. Anna wasn't there. We searched everywhere but found no trace of Murphy's only child.

Unfortunately I was out of ant vomit. I liked that particular spell as it made tracking easy when the trail was this fresh. While Murphy was on her cell phone reporting Anna as missing, probably kidnapped under the circumstances, I was looking around for Bob. I was sure that he could come up with a way to track Anna quickly enough that we could get her out of whatever trouble she was in, but I couldn't find his skull.

They had both been taken. It was a reasonable assumption that they had both been taken together as I had talked to Bob just before I had gotten into the shower this morning. I knew that his skull had been on my desk. In less than an hour both Anna and Bob had gone missing. I could feel the dark side of my nature starting to creep out of the box I normally had it nailed inside. It's only question was, which side of the fence did the creep who had taken our families come from, Murphy's or mine? I intended to find out, and with Bob missing too, I had a way to do so.

Chapter 6

ANNA MURPHY

Anna Murphy didn't like the man who had taken her or his aco, ack, the man who was driving the car. The second man was as skinny as the first one was huge but didn't have any tattoos like the first one did. She decided to call the first man Mr. Tattoo and the second Mr. Skinny. Mr. Tattoo carried her over to where Mr. Skinny was waiting by a car.

It was a Ford and had four doors and was brown. Anna knew that she had to remember the details like that because her mother had always told her that it was the details that solved a case. She had also said that witnesses often made mistakes because they didn't take the time to really remember what was happening. She was going to be a good witness when her mom came and arrested Mr. Tattoo and Mr. Skinny.

Mr. Skinny had long brown hair and eyes and his skin looked funny like he was almost yellow. Mr. Tattoo had a spider web on his neck and climbing roses with barbed wire running up and down his arms. While she was busy making sure she could remember what the car and the two perps looked like, Mr. Skinny opened the trunk and Mr. Tattoo shoved her inside. Mr. Skinny slammed the lid shut and Anna could feel the car dip and sway as the two men go into the car. She heard the engine start and rolled a bit in the dark of the trunk as the car began to drive away.

Anna hugged the ancient skull to her chest, wrapping herself around it. She had to make sure that it wasn't crushed and the evidence destroyed. She rubbed the surface of the skull with one hand. For some reason holding it so tightly gave her a slightly warmer feeling around her middle where a jumble of ice had gathered. She told herself that the ice was anger. She refused to admit that she was scared or that she was sniffling. Her mom was going to find her and then when that happened, Mr. Tattoo and Mr. Skinny were going to go 'SPLAT!' like the villains did in the comic books before she arrested them.

Chapter Seven

HROTHBERT OF BAINBRIDGE

Bob, (he had considered it his name now for years) had long ago learned how to pull in every nuance of his limited perception while he was confined to his Winifred's skull. Thus he had been aware for some time that he was being held by a small person, most likely a child, in much the same way that Harry had done when he had first come to live with his uncle. The child was frightened because he or she, Bob wasn't sure which, had been screaming, although he could now only hear a barely perceived sniffle.

Once, back when Bob had been Hrothbert of Bainbridge and still among the living, he had inured himself to such sounds. Now after nearly a thousand years as a ghost and becoming Bob through Harry's teaching, he could no longer ignore them. They broke his no longer beating heart. He projected comfort and warmth as hard as he could. If he could project the menace and darkness of his curse then he could project the opposite as well.

The slam of two doors and the rocking motion they were subjected to told Bob that they were in a car. 'A frightened child plus a car plus the fact that my love's skull has not been removed from the child's arms equals some sort of kidnapping,' Bob reasoned. If the child had been throwing a tantrum he knew that Harry at least would have removed his lady's skull from the child's clutches. He could not hear anything aside from the child's faint sniffles and what he thought perhaps might be the vehicles motor. He should have heard at least one adult by now.

Suspicious of the lack of other noises, Bob carefully eased himself out of the cursed skull, only to confront a smaller space than he had expected. He had ridden in various vehicles before but he had not expected to emerge in a trunk. However, it simply confirmed his original thoughts, that the child was being kidnapped. At least he knew that Harry would soon find the child, all he had to do was follow the tracking spell that he had conveniently forgotten to return to the Wardens. Until then, well he would do what little he could to watch over the poor girl who he could now see holding onto his lady's skull.

Chapter Eight

WINIFRED OF BAINBRIDGE

Winifred of Bainbridge stood looking out the window of Maria Sanchez's office. Maria was the latest in the long line of eldest daughters who had watched over her and her love's skull. She was also one of the most stubborn and at the moment that was the problem. Maria worked hard for her community, working as an assistant to one of the community leaders. She also allowed Winifred to openly operate as her assistant, something that Winifred was grateful for. However, she was not grateful enough to allow her only hope to for reuniting with her lost love to be lost because of Maria's stubbornness.

Maria completely refused to acknowledge that she had ever been married before her current husband or that she had a child, more importantly a daughter, with that first husband. She had completely erased their existence from her mind and had forbidden Winifred to ever speak of them again. It wasn't because she felt that divorce was wrong or shameful. It was because neither her first husband nor her eldest daughter could wield magic.

­­

That didn't matter to Winifred; in fact she had been rather grateful that she would have had a break from being a teacher for the first time in nearly a thousand years. Maria had not allowed her that option. She had divorced Joe Murphy and had gone on to remarry a wizard of middling ability within six months. While Enrique Sanchez was a better husband to Maria, he wasn't the father of her eldest daughter. Maria's announcement that morning to her daughter Eva that one day she would inherit Winifred and the skull had resulted in a dreadful fight once the child had left the room.

For the first time Winifred had fought the compulsion to obey the orders of those who owned Hrothbert's skull. She had shouted Constantia's name and reminded Maria that she had an older daughter. The agony had been worth it. Not even knowing the agony that Winifred was going through had been enough to persuade Maria to acknowledge the truth and that had shown Winifred that she had to act to save herself. If she did not, then Maria's stubborn denial would doom her and her love for all eternity, exactly as the Council had wanted. That was something that she would not allow to happen.

Chapter Nine

WINIFRED OF BAINBRIDGE

"Carlos, I need you to do something for me," Winifred said. She was standing in Maria's office where she taught Maria's children the art of magic.

Carlos, the youngest boy at thirteen, looked at her worriedly. "You're not going to have me do something nice, are you? Not that I wouldn't do something nice for you, ma'am, it's just that,"

Winifred smiled. She understood how difficult it was for the boy, growing up where he was. He had to maintain an aura of macho manliness or risk becoming a target of the local gangs. "Actually I want you to steal something for me."

"You want me," he pointed at his chest, "to steal something," he pointed at her, "for you? That don't make sense!"

"Actually Carlos, what I want you to steal, is me," she answered calmly. "Your family has been given a legacy, a duty to uphold and your mother refuses to do so. She is going to break the chain of custody," (Winifred used the term because Carlos loved to read the CSI Miami books, Eric Delko was his favorite character) and give me to Eva. I cannot tell you why this breaks the line of guardians because your mother has forbidden me to speak of the matter. You do know however that I must be given to the eldest daughter of each generation. For a thousand years your family has guarded me and upheld this duty." She looked at the boy and waited for him to connect the dots. It didn't take long. Carlos wasn't a stupid boy with no thoughts in his head but TV, video games and girls. Of course, part of the reason was that neither of the electronic devices would work around him for long but he did have a good head on his shoulders.

"Do you know where my oldest sister is?" he asked quietly. He didn't know if the girl had been given away or if she was with her father but that didn't matter. Winifred had to be given to whoever she was. A thousand years of doing the right thing in guarding Winifred's ghost should not, COULD not, be thrown away simply because of his mother's shame.

"You must send me to the Chicago Police Department, District 27, care of Officer Murphy," Winifred could say the name as long as she didn't say which Officer Murphy she was referring to. "Write a note and explain that the skull is the inheritance of your mother's eldest daughter. The officers will take care of the matter. They take care of their own."

Chapter Ten

HARRY DRESDEN

There was one thing that I'd learned working for the Chicago Police Department and that was no matter how an officer was viewed by his or her fellow officers, whether they were thought of as the ultimate cop or the worst dregs of the department, when that officer needed help, they got the backing of every cop out there. When a family member of a cop went missing, especially a child; well, the crook who had taken that family member had a better chance of walking on air than he did of getting away with it, at least he did if he wasn't using magic. That was one thing that I didn't have any experience with.

When it came to mixing Murphy's world and mine, usually there were no family members involved. I just hoped to God that it remained that way. I had no wish for Anna to become a victim of someone who wanted to steal Bob's skull. A kidnapper of little girls I could handle, in fact I had cheerful plans of making the oaf's life misery, (boils, body rot and intestinal difficulties came to mind), and that is if the cops left anything of him. Anna being taken because of me, I couldn't.

I had used the tracking spell that the Wardens had given me once before when Bob had been stolen while Murphy drove my jeep over to the precinct. The Wardens and the Council didn't like it when just anyone had ownership of Bob, but they couldn't take him away from me as I was the legal owner of his skull. That didn't mean that they hadn't tried to while I was on trial. If I hadn't gotten off, I shudder to think what would have become of my oldest friend. All that I had seen with my Sight when I had used the tracking spell was that Anna was the one now in possession of Bob's skull. She had been clutching Bob in a small, dark space. From what Murphy and I had figured out at the shop, that meant that they were in the trunk of a car. No one had breached my wards and I had only heard the shop bell ring once. Anna had left the building on her own, taking Bob with her. Actually, that was the one thing that comforted me. Bob may be completely insubstantial, unable to affect the material world, but there was no one that I trusted more. He would look after Anna.


	2. Chapter 2

Prologue

Chapter Eleven

ANNA MURPHY

Anna was doing her best, but she was upset. That was why when a ball of gold and black sparkles came out of the skull and turned into a man, she screamed. The trunk lid and part of the back of the trunk exploded. She hadn't meant to do that. She really hadn't! Weird stuff just sort of happened when she got upset. Child and ghost stared at one another for a short moment before Bob came back to his senses. "Take the skull and run! Don't drop it and don't lose it. I can't help you if you don't have me with you. Now go!" with that he rushed back into his skull.

Anna was confused but not stupid. She jumped out of the car, (it had stopped with a jerk when the back end came apart) and fell onto the street. She quickly rolled under a parked car and then looked around for another hiding place. She didn't know why the man, or whatever he was, hadn't done anything but offer to help. It was this sort of thing that had made her father send her away and yet, all he had done was just to tell her to run away from the men who had kidnapped her. He hadn't been upset at all.

The gold and black sparkles came back out of the skull resting under her chest and between her arms, swirled around a bit before diving into the storm drain next to the front wheel of the car above them. It a matter of seconds it returned and once more became a man. "Go down into the storm drain. I do believe that you are slender enough to make it through the entrance. You must hurry; whoever took you will be looking for you. He won't look down there and as long as you keep moving he won't find you."

Anna nodded. That made a lot of sense. "Um, do you think that the skull will break if I drop it?"

The man looked at the skull and at Anna. "Wrap it up in your jacket and place it in your backpack. As long as you are careful in how you drop it, it should be fine. Be careful getting yourself down as well."

Anna nodded again and did as the strange man directed. She dropped her backpack and the skull with it, down the storm drain and then crawled backwards through the hole. It was a tight squeeze but she managed to get herself down under the storm drain and into the tunnels underneath the street. The drop wasn't too bad either, although she didn't like the dirty water she ended up standing in. She picked up her backpack from where she had dropped it. She was relieved to see that the skull wasn't damaged, at least no more than it had been before she dropped it. "Very good," she heard from behind her. "Now, are you injured in anyway?" Anna shook her head. "Excellent," the strange man looked around and then pointed down the tunnel. "I do believe that if we travel in that direction, we will be able to find a way out and eventually return you to your mother, and I to Harry."

"Ok," Anna said as she started walking in the direction he had pointed.

"Now, I do believe that introductions are in order." he said as he walked beside her.

"I'm Anna Murphy," she said.

"Ah, you must be Lieutenant Murphy's daughter. I am pleased to make your acquaintance," Bob said. He was delighted at this turn of events. Anna's earlier use of magic had concerned him, but now he realized that it would actually help in bringing the lieutenant further into Harry's world.

"And Sergeant Murphy's granddaughter!" Anna said proudly.

Bob bowed low. "Hrothbert of Bainbridge, former sorcerer at your service, but you may call me Bob, my dear."

"I like Bob better than Hrothbert."

"As do I," he replied.

"Why are you a former sorcerer and why were you in the lady's skull?" Anna asked as she hiked her backpack higher onto her shoulders. "Do you live with Mr. Dresden?"

Bob stopped for half a step, startled before continuing on his way. "You, my dear, are the first person who has ever seemed to realize that the skull did not originally belong to me."

Anna stared. "Duh! It's a lady skull!"

"Indeed she is," Bob smiled sadly. "And yes, in a way I do live with Harry, or rather the skull belongs to Harry and I go with it. You see, I am a ghost."

"Neat!"

Chapter 12

HARRY DRESDEN

"Stay back Dresden!" Kirmani yelled. He was hustling Murphy into a room filled with electronic equipment. Kirmani may not have understood why electronics and I didn't get along but he did have enough experience to understand that me plus a lot of electronics in the same room was a bad thing, especially if we needed to have those electronics work in order to find one missing child and a skull.

"Whoever took Anna put her in the trunk of a car and was headed west," I yelled through the door. Kirmani nodded and gestured at the computers and the lab tech in front of him and Murphy. I just hoped that they would have better luck than I did when it came to tracking down that particular car. I was damned good at finding things and people, but I needed something to connect me to the car or the person driving it. The only connection I had was to Bob. I wasn't about to ask Murphy for Anna's necklace now. It was also a good thing that although Kirmani didn't like me, he did acknowledge two things; one, that I would never deliberately hurt Murphy, not for anything in the world and two, that I knew stuff that he couldn't explain. I would never yank anyone's chain over this and he knew it. So he wouldn't bother to try and confirm the information that I had given him, nor would Murphy tell him how I got it.

While the tech guys did what they do best to find the car and Anna, I went to the stairwell and down to the bottom landing, to do what I do best. Now, I could have found an out of the way corner closer to Murphy, but I was more than a little upset. Whoever had taken Anna had taken both an innocent little girl, the only child of the woman I love, and the only family I had left. That meant that I had less control over power surges than usual, and the way I felt now I would probably short out the entire building when, not if, I had one. That was the downside of being the type of wizard I was.

Bob had tried for years to teach me finesse, but I had too much power for my level of skill to handle. The first time I tried to light a candle, I set the table on fire. Rather than try to achieve the impossible, I had settled for the near impossible, learning how to manage the power I had, trading finesse for brute strength. Dealing with finesse meant using small amounts of power. Learning spells that could handle my power levels had taken as much time as learning the basics. It had taken too much of my time really. I had been forced to drop out of high school to deal with the problem.

Now I was as good as I was going to get when it came to handling my power, or at least I knew a lot more tricks to dealing with it than I ever had before. The real problem these days was handling the power surges that came with really strong emotions. I sat down on the landing and crossed my legs. Pulling a small crystal skull out of my pocket I grabbed the metal railing with my other hand. With any luck, (not that mine was of much use most days,) the surge that I knew would come would ground itself into the metal. I closed my eyes and my fist, activating the tracking spell. Images flashed through my mind, a quiet street, a car bursting apart at the seams in the back, Anna dropping a backpack down a storm drain, Anna crawling down after it. The last image terrified me and I lost control of my magic.

The surge that I had tried to prepare for slammed out of me and out into the building around me. All of the lights burst, and the security camera burst first into sparks and then flames. I didn't bother to watch. The moment the magic receded; I was up and running up the stairs. Anna was down in the storm drain system. That was a really, really bad place for a little girl to be, especially one that appeared to have a touch, probably more, of magic.

Chapter 13

CONNIE MURPHY

Technically I wasn't supposed to work on Anna's kidnapping. I was her mother. On the other hand, no one was pointing that out as we looked through the open case files for a likely suspect and through the traffic cam footage for any vehicle that might have been anywhere near Harry's office in the last hour. That was one of the good things about this case. We knew within two minutes of the kidnapping where Anna had disappeared from, that she was probably in a car trunk, and that the kidnappers were headed west, at least according to Harry. The other good thing was that Traffic had also installed traffic cams two blocks west of Harry's office. If we were lucky, we had Anna's kidnapping on tape.

I don't know how Harry does it, where he gets his information or how his 'magic' stuff works, but I have learned over the last year the he was usually right, even if he wasn't always completely honest with me. He was also usually bloody, bruised and occasionally broken by the time the case was solved, but he was the last guy standing while the perps were down, and that counts as a win in my book. So I wasn't going to dismiss anything that he told us about Anna.

The tech guys found exactly what they were looking for within just a few minutes. In fact, the longest part about the whole thing was waiting for the right tapes to be collected. Jackson did his digital enhancement thing and in the background we could clearly see a large man in a t-shirt picking up a struggling child. "Keep on that bastard," I heard the Captain growl, but I was distracted by a uniform charging in with a package.

"The label says it's for Officer Murphy. We didn't want to take the chance," he shrugged and I steeled myself to open the package. I didn't want to open it. It wasn't too early for the kidnapper to be sending me something to prove that he had Anna. I silently prayed that whoever had taken Anna hadn't sent me a piece of her as I opened the box. There was a note and Dresden's skull inside. I slammed on my game face, the one that I use when my emotions are running high and I have to keep my mind on the job rather than how awful the job is.

"What the heck is that?" I hadn't noticed the cops gathering around me.

"It's Dresden's pet skull. Anna had it. It was missing from his desk this morning after Anna was taken."

"The kidnapper may have sent the skull but he doesn't have Anna!" Jackson exclaimed. He had still been following the brown Ford on the tapes. "Take a look at this Lieutenant." The image on the screen didn't make sense to me at first, not until I realized that the car hadn't actually blown up. It had simply, and rather violently, come apart. The back doors burst open and fell off, the roof peeled off towards the front, the lid of the trunk blew off, etc. and all of it happened in a matter of seconds. If I hadn't known better then I would have said that Harry was in that vehicle. Then I could see Anna falling out of what was left of the trunk and scurrying under a nearby parked car. "That's the last image we have of Anna Murphy."

"That's because she's underground, in the storm drain system. We need to find her and get her out of there fast," Harry said from the doorway. I could tell from the way he was practically bouncing in the doorway that he wanted to run in and drag me out, but he didn't. That was one of the things I respected about him. He knew he did something to electronics just by being around them that screwed them up and he did his best to avoid the stuff that the city shelled out a lot of cash for on our behalf.

"Whoever took her sent us your pet skull," I said, walking over to the door and shoving the box at him.

"Ah, no. Anna had my skull with her went she went into the storm drain," Dresden said firmly. "That's not mine." He took the box and we all followed him out of the room. He pulled the skull out and examined it. "It's not mine, but it's a really good copy." Then he just stopped and stared at the skull, his eyes growing wide with horror. "Oh god, tell me they didn't do that," he whispered.

I ignored his theatrics. "What do you mean that isn't yours. That's real bone Dresden, no way that's plastic."

Dresden glared at me. "I've had Bob from the time I was eleven years old. Trust me, I know every millimeter of that skull and this one isn't it." He went back to looking heart stricken at the skull in his hands. "But it looks like this might be Bob," he muttered to himself.

"It isn't, Bob," Kirmani said, wincing at the name and holding up a note. "Apparently the skull's name is Winifred and it's your inheritance from your mom Murphy, or at least I think that's who Maria Sanchez is. It's got nothing to do with Anna."

"Right, ah we need to go after Anna, there's no telling what she'll run into down there." Dresden shoved the skull into his backpack "Kirmani why don't you stay here and help bring in the guy who took Anna. We'll go after her."

I could tell that Kirmani thought Harry was shoveling crap at him. "I'll tell the Captain where we're going," he told me. I nodded. I wanted all the backup I could get. Anna deserved nothing less and if Harry was nervous, well I had learned to be careful when Harry got nervous.

Chapter Fourteen

HROTHBERT OF BAINBRIDGE

Bob knew that not only would those who had kidnapped young Anna be looking for her, there would be others down in the storm drain system that would love to get their hands on her, or him for that matter. So he kept his eyes open and racked his memory of the spells that a child of Anna's age and apparent ability might be able to use for defense.

"Mr. Tattoo and Mr. Skinny aren't going to stop looking for me Bob. Can you do anything to stop them so that my mom can arrest them? Some of the ghost stories I've heard says that ghosts can move things like ropes and tie people up with it." Anna said it very matter factly. Bob was impressed with her composure, but he wasn't fooled by it. He knew that for her to even bring the subject up meant that she was very worried and scared, the way she had reacted to his appearance had shown that.

"Unfortunately, I am not that sort of ghost. I am unable to affect the physical world in any fashion. However, one of the reasons I'm still around is to act as a sort of magical library. I know a great deal about magic and the various ways to use it."

Anna stopped and turned, facing Bob. "We need to do something. They're going to find us."

Bob took in her pale face and voice that trembled even as she did her best to remain calm. He had no doubt that she was trying to live up to her heritage as a police officer's child. "I may not be able to do much, child. However, that does not mean that I am useless." He gave her his best smirk. "You see, there's this little thing called psychological warfare." He bent down so that he could look her in the eyes. "With your hands and my knowledge, there is a great deal that we can do together to, how shall I put this?"

"Mess them up?" Anna asked. Bob smiled and nodded. They put their heads together and began to plan.

Chapter Fifteen

HARRY DRESDEN

The car that had been transporting Anna wasn't hard to find. Cops were crawling all over what was left of it and they had the street blocked off but I was able to find a place to park close by. Close up the destruction was more complete than I had thought. I had only seen a short glimpse of it with the tracking spell because of the spell's focus being Bob. "Harry tell me she's ok," Murphy demanded.

"She was fine when she ducked into the storm drain," I tried to reassure her. "We just need to find her before something down there does." The wind shifted, bringing with it the faint taste/smell of the magic used in Anna's escape. To my surprise it reminded me slightly of Ancient Mia, who I suspected of being a dragon. I knew for a fact that she was a shapeshifter, the most obvious clue being that she had never looked the same at any meeting I had, had with her. Unfortunately, I didn't have the time to investigate. I had to get us down into the storm tunnels as quickly as possible.

"Harry, what happened to that car?" Murphy asked as we got out of my jeep.

I was busy checking my pack for supplies, mostly stuff that I had grabbed at random out of my office and out of the back of my jeep, so I wasn't really thinking when I answered Murphy. "Anna happened," I said as I packed two slices of pizza I'd swiped from the break room down at the precinct.

"WHAT! HARRY!" Murphy spluttered.

"We don't have time!" I snapped. Anna Murphy's terrified burst of raw power had shown an enormous amount of potential, far more than I would have expected coming from the Murphy family. Looking around to make sure that no one was watching, I pulled the storm drain cover out of the concrete with a little magic. I knew Kirmani and Murphy were probably gapping at me but things were going to get a lot stranger than that for them. Murphy in particular was going to have to learn how to deal with my world now that her daughter was showing the gift. Knowing her, I had a pretty good idea that she would be as protective of Anna as my father had been of me, and I would be there to make sure that this time, she had the backup that my father hadn't had.

Chapter Sixteen

ANNA MURPHY

Anna liked Bob the ghost. He had the best ideas for pranks to play on Mr. Tattoo and Mr. Skinny. First he wrote messages in the air. That was neat. She had to be careful not to touch them because they disappeared if she did. He had explained that not only would the messages make the creeps nervous; they were also just like when her mom yelled, 'Freeze Police!' at the bad guys. Good guys always gave the bad guys a chance to surrender, and they were the good guys.

Of course because Bob was a ghost he couldn't touch anything. That was where Anna came in. Bob showed her how to set up the traps. He even guided her hands like her mom did when they were making cookies together. Anna was setting up a slime slide when she found a toy magic wand. "Bob, how do you tell if a magic wand is a toy or real?"

"Ah, that is an intelligent question. The answer on the other hand is a bit more complicated than most would suspect." Bob led Anna further down the tunnels. "In the hands of a gifted person, a wizard or sorcerer for example, any wooden object that can be pointed can be used as a wand, however when channeling a significant charge of energy, a wand is not enough. A staff is necessary for anything truly large, but as with a wand, anything made of wood that can be pointed is sufficient. Harry uses a wooden drumstick as a wand and a hockey stick as his staff for instance."

"How do you know someone can do real magic?" Anna wanted to know.

Bob stopped at an intersection of the tunnels. "We don't want to go down there," he muttered quietly. He smirked and then wrote another message in the entryway of the tunnel he didn't want to take Anna down. "This way my dear," he said a bit louder and led her down the other tunnel. "The gift for magic manifests itself in late childhood to early puberty, between the ages of ten to thirteen. There are exceptions, but those are usually the result of having a magical entity somewhere in the family tree, having a dragon for an ancestor, for instance."

"Dragons for ancestors? You mean that dragons can have babies with people?" Anna gaped at Bob.

Bob looked sternly down at Anna. "Dragons are people. Never forget that Anna. They tend to get very testy when they think that those they are dealing with are prejudiced against them."

"I'm sorry, I didn't know that," Anna said ashamed. Her mother would be ashamed if she thought that Anna was acting like one of the idiots that committed hate crimes.

Bob smiled gently. "True ignorance is one thing and I am certain that you are the sort of person who does their best to correct their ignorance rather than be complacent and embrace the state." Anna was staring back at him confused. "I mean that when you make a mistake you do your best to learn from it and correct it. When you know that you do not know something you do your best to learn about it rather than just continuing on making the same mistake over and over again."

"Making the same mistake over and over again is stupid!" Anna snorted. Then she gnawed on her lip, "Bob, do you think, well I'm not ten yet but things, things have been happening around me when I'm upset, like what happened with the car. Do you think that's magic?"

"I know it is magic. You have a strong gift, and I mentioned the dragons because your magic has a similar feel to it. That wand would make a good beginners tool for you." Bob said gently.

"Could you teach me?" Anna asked hopefully.

"I would be honored, but we must ask your mother for permission."

Chapter Seventeen

HARRY DRESDEN

As soon as we were down in the tunnels I swept the cover back over the storm drain hole. The last thing I wanted was more cops coming down here to look for Anna, even if that was where her kidnapers had gone as well. The reason I knew that was because on the opposite side of the tunnel from where we had jumped down were two trails of adult foot prints, but I could see no sign of Anna's. Well, that and the storm drain cover had been a lot easier to move than it should have been. Someone had moved it not long before we got there. Personally I hoped that they ran into a rumble of smeekers. Smeekers are a sort of snake crossed with a rat and a small, very small, fairy. Don't ask me how that one happened, all I know is they're as fertile as rats, mean as fairies, and hungry like a swarm of starving locusts. You really don't want to know what they get from the snake. Yuck.

The tracking spell that was linked to Bob wouldn't show me anything but bare tunnels which meant that I was going to have to use another way to track our missing people. Fortunately, thanks to Murphy's mother, I now had a truly foolproof way of doing so. I reached into my pack and brought out the skull that was inside. I raised it up and looked once more at the, oh so familiar and heart wrenching grin; Bob's grin. I had known for years that Bob's facial features, most notably his teeth, did not match what I saw when he materialized. I had always thought that Bob had changed his appearance to suit himself, after all the man had been dead for more years than anyone knew. Why shouldn't he change his looks if he wanted?

But this skull had Bob's smile, while the skull he had been imprisoned in did not. Knowing the Council the way I did, that could only mean one thing. Bob had been imprisoned inside not his skull, but most likely what they would see as his greatest victim's, Winifred. Knowing just how much Bob loved Winifred, even now; the very idea chilled my soul. The worst part of that was the fact that this skull, Bob's skull, was also covered in the curse runes that kept Bob imprisoned. There was no way that Bob could know that most likely his lady, his great love, was as imprisoned as he was. He would have begged me to find her if he had.

I held the skull out to Murphy. "Listen to me Murphy. I know that you don't believe in magic. I know that you don't want to know the truth about this sort of thing, but you don't have a choice now. That's why I didn't make you ditch Kirmani. He's going to be your witness that what you're going to see is real, not just right now but from now until we find Anna and get her out of here. Now, your mom sent you this skull. That means the skull belongs to you and to you alone. The runes on the skull tell me that there is a ghost imprisoned in this skull. Only the owner of the skull can command the ghost, no one else." I could see that Murphy still didn't understand. Sighing I reached out and took one of her hands in mine and placed the skull, (Bob's skull! I was never going to get used to that!) into hers. "Just tell the ghost to come out. I need to use whoever the ghost is to track Bob."

Chapter Seventeen

CONNIE MURPHY

I looked at the skull I now had in my hands and looked back at Harry. I didn't want to deal with this. I just wanted to find Anna, alive and well. To do that I needed Harry and he needed me to make a fool of myself. 'Well, it isn't like you haven't been down that road before Murphy,' I thought remembering the one time Harry and I had kissed. I took a deep breath. "Come on out ghost whoever you are."

I didn't expect to see a sparkle of gold and black emerge from the eye socket. I was even more startled to see that sparkle start to swirl around and turn into the form of a woman, a woman I recognized. "AUNT WINNIE?" I gasped. Aunt Winnie had disappeared long before my mother left my father. She had read me bedtime stories and watched me when my mother was busy. She had been my favorite babysitter, hands down. She had never once been anything but nice to me.

"It is good to see you again, Constantia," she said with a nod. "I hadn't hoped that you would remember me."

"You're a ghost!?" I spluttered.

She merely nodded. "From eldest daughter to eldest daughter for a thousand years your family has guarded me and my prison so that one day a prophesy may be fulfilled. Now the duty has been passed on to you." Winifred stopped and looked around. This place was not where she had expected to have this conversation. "May I ask why we're in," she gestured around her, "this place?"

"My daughter Anna was kidnapped this morning. She escaped and came down here. Harry says that he needs your help to find her." I gestured at Harry. She turned towards him with a single lifted eyebrow. I remembered that look, but never in all the years could I remember trying had I been able to copy it. Harry wasn't going to weasel out of this one.

Chapter Eighteen

HARRY DRESDEN

This was Winifred, Bob's Winifred. She stood tall and graceful in front of me, wearing a modern woman's business suit. It suited her just as Bob always wore his suit with panache. With the heels she was probably Bob's height and her hair dark red hair was braided into a type of bun. When she turned to me and gave me that look, I couldn't help what came out of my mouth. "You two so belong together."

When the look on her face turned to confusion I blushed. I really hadn't meant to say that out loud but it was true. The very look she had first given me told me that she was more than a match for Bob, the snark master extraordinaire. "Harry Dresden at your service, Lady Winifred of Bainbridge," I said with a bow.

"I was never a lady Wizard and how are you aware of my name?" The coldness in her voice was reminiscent of what I had heard from Bob at his angriest. This was one dead and damned sorceress that I did not want to cross. Good thing for me I didn't want to do anything that would get me into trouble with her.

"I'm the current owner of Hrothbert of Bainbridge's prison and you have always been his lady," I said at my gentlest. "Bob was the one who raised me after my father died. Officially it was my uncle who was raising me, but truthfully I spent a lot more time with a certain grumpy ghost. Right now Anna Murphy has Bob's prison with her. While I do have a tracking spell on it that only shows me the area where it is. As you can see," I gestured to the concrete walls around me, "that's not going to do me a lot of good down here. However, he is connected to you and you are connected to him in ways that cannot be broken. With your permission, I can use that connection to track them down."

I had always been very careful before to never refer to Bob's skull as his prison, not wanting to deliberately remind him of his cursed state and punishment. That was something that I would never do again. It had to hurt him far worse to know that he was imprisoned inside his lady's skull than anything I could do or say to remind him of how he came to be there.

Chapter Nineteen

WINIFRED OF BAINBRIDGE

Winifred stared at the wizard in shock as the prophecy ran through her mind once more. The one thing that hadn't changed in all of the centuries she had been a ghost was that people, regardless of their station in life, loved to gossip. So she knew who Harry Dresden was, and what he had done; namely the fact that he had killed his uncle, Justin Morningway with Black Magic. She also knew that he had somehow managed to survive the White Council's trial. The Morningway line was one of the more powerful ones among wizards and it had long been rumored that it was as black as it was powerful, but the man standing in front of her was no dark wizard. The tainted line had finally born a white knight.

Winifred had known real knights when she was alive. They had simply been the soldiers of the time, but even then a few of them had been the sort of men who had inspired the myth of the white knight. They had been the sort of men who had been unable to do the wrong thing, no matter how it had affected them personally. She had met more of them over the centuries and because of the prophecy, she had done her best to learn to spot them. Harry Dresden was just that sort of man.

Mentally Winifred gave herself a shake and returned her focus to the matter at hand. The sooner they found young Anna, the sooner she would be reunited with Hrothbert. "With your permission?" she asked Constantia.

"Harry, just do whatever it is you're going to do and let's get on with it. The longer we wait, the closer the perps are getting to Anna."

"Right," Harry said and cast a simple like to like spell.

Winifred would have once felt immediate distain for such a performance. Now, having taught children to master their abilities for so long, she felt much more sympathetic. "You say that Hrothbert was your teacher?" she asked as she turned and began following the pull of magic that would lead her to all that was left of her mortal remains. What was once a part of a person remained so forever, that was the connection the magic was able to use.

Harry squirmed a bit. "It's not Bob's fault. He tried to teach me finesse, but my magic runs more towards brute force." Harry hesitated before going on. "He doesn't know about you. I mean, he knows that it's your skull he's trapped in, obviously. He just doesn't know that you're trapped in his skull."

"I know," Winifred said gently. That had been one of the conditions she had been forced to deal with.

"Excuse me," Murphy jumped in. "Would someone please fill me in here? Who is Hrothbert or Bob or whatever his name is? Why is he trapped in her skull and vice versa?" She held up the hand that wasn't holding her gun. "I get that he's your 'tea expert', Harry. I get that he's a ghost too, that he raised you and that he's the one who taught you to do your thing. Tell me what I don't know."

Winifred glanced back at the mortals behind her. This was bound to be interesting.

"Ok," Harry glanced around. All three of his companions, even Kirmani who was supposed to be watching their backs, had their eyes glued to him. "His name is Hrothbert of Bainbridge but I call him Bob. When he was alive he was one of the most powerful sorcerers around."

"And the imprisoned inside the skull thing?" Murphy asked. "Let me guess, he was the bad guy in the fairy tale; selfish, cruel, hated everyone and power hungry. How did Winifred get mixed up in it? Did he kill his unwanted wife for a new piece of tail?"

Winifred would have verbally flayed Constantia for voicing the suggestion, if it hadn't been for the fear in her eyes. Winifred took in the guns in both Constantia's and the other man's hands and realized that was the sort of man that, as a police officer, she had to deal with often. As Hrothbert was the only thing currently standing between young Anna and those who had kidnapped her, not to mention on the other horrors that might be lurking in this place, Winifred could understand her position.

"No, but in a way it might have been better if he had been that sort of man. Hrothbert only loved two things, knowledge and Winifred. What he didn't care about was how he got that knowledge. Eventually he fell deep into the Black. Even then things might have worked out the way things usually do; hero rides in, the bad guy goes down, and everybody celebrates, except that when they tried to take him out, Winifred was killed and he wasn't. I don't know all of the details, but I'm pretty sure he went crazy with grief."

Harry paused and a wave of sadness crossed over his face. "He used his knowledge to bring Winifred back from the dead. Do you remember that case we had a while back? The one with Sharon, morgue assistant?" Murphy and Kirmani both nodded. "Well, bringing someone back is supposed to be impossible for even a wizard but it can be done, if the one casting the spell is willing to pay the price. Very few people know that it is possible, Sharon is one of them and Bob is another. While I don't know what sort of price they both paid to cast that spell, I do know the price the White Council exacted on Bob for his crimes. He was caught and his sentence was to spend all of eternity trapped inside of her skull as a ghost, only until today I thought it was his own skull. I don't know why Winifred here is in the same position though; she would have been seen as the victim."

"Because it was the only way to fulfill the prophecy," Winifred answered.

Chapter Twenty

CONNIE MURPHY

"What prophecy?!" Murphy demanded. That was the second time that Winifred had mentioned a prophecy. If she was supposed to be involved in a prophecy, she wanted to know exactly what it was. The tunnel wasn't giving her any more information other than they were still going in the same directions as the footprints. This wasn't the first time she'd had to trust in Harry's magic, but she was always happier when she could see some physical evidence he was right.

"When a tainted line brings forth a white knight/The black soul shall repent/And redeem himself for the sake of the knight/Only then shall lovers be reunited in death. From eldest daughter to eldest daughter/This trust shall be given/As one is guarded/So must the other be." Winifred quoted serenely.

Murphy could see Harry blanch. "What Harry!"

"It's already happened. Do you remember what I told you about my uncle? That he killed my father with the Black?"

"And you killed him," Murphy finished. She still wasn't sure what to think about that one.

"I had found the evidence that he had killed my father. I was demanding that he confess. We both were using magic. He was throwing things at me and I squeezed the doll that he killed my dad with. I'm not proud of that, but I just wanted him to tell the truth. He threw a table at me and I threw myself on the ground. I fell on the doll and he died. The Council ruled it as self defense." She could see how even talking about the subject brought back haunting memories for him, but if there was one thing that she knew about Harry Dresden it was that he wasn't the one who had started the fight.

"He had made contingency plans though, a silacrum of himself that would take his place if he ever died. The silicrum was to make a deal with Bob; release Bob from his curse, return him to mortality in exchange for bringing my uncle back from the dead. Bob went along with it in order to save my life and to make sure that my uncle was destroyed forever. I'm just glad that for Bob, once cursed means forever cursed. He returned to being a ghost after he gave up his life for mine."

"That's how the crushing evidence disappeared from your uncle's corpse?" Kirmani butted into the discussion.

Harry nodded. "The point is; Hrothbert of Bainbridge would never have given up his life for anyone except Winifred. Bob did for me, which fulfills the prophecy."

"And if Maria had been allowed her way, it wouldn't have made a bit of difference." Murphy could hear the growl in Winifred's voice. "She did not wish to acknowledge that she had ever been married to Sergeant Murphy. I'm afraid that included refusing to admit to your existence Constantia."

Murphy shrugged. That wasn't anything she hadn't long ago figured out. "It's Connie or Murphy, not Constantia."

"As you wish," Winifred said.

"So what did you do?" Harry asked. Murphy wanted to know as well. There was no way that Winifred would have let that get in her way.

Winifred smirked. "I had your brother Carlos mail Hrothbert's skull to your father's station."

All three of the mortals laughed at that. "Sneaky," Kirmani said admiringly. "Hey Dresden, there are some more of those weird floating words up ahead."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Twenty One

CONNIE MURPHY

"What prophecy?!" Murphy demanded. That was the second time that Winifred had mentioned a prophecy. If she was supposed to be involved in a prophecy, she wanted to know exactly what it was. The tunnel wasn't giving her any more information other than they were still going in the same directions as the footprints. This wasn't the first time she'd had to trust in Harry's magic, but she was always happier when she could see some physical evidence he was right.

"When a tainted line brings forth a white knight/The black soul shall repent/And redeem himself for the sake of the knight/Only then shall lovers be reunited in death. From eldest daughter to eldest daughter/This trust shall be given/As one is guarded/So must the other be." Winifred quoted serenely.

Murphy could see Harry blanch. "What Harry!"

"It's already happened. Do you remember what I told you about my uncle? That he killed my father with the Black?"

"And you killed him," Murphy finished. She still wasn't sure what to think about that one.

"I had found the evidence that he had killed my father. I was demanding that he confess. We both were using magic. He was throwing things at me and I squeezed the doll that he killed my dad with. I'm not proud of that, but I just wanted him to tell the truth. He threw a table at me and I threw myself on the ground. I fell on the doll and he died. The Council ruled it as self defense." She could see how even talking about the subject brought back haunting memories for him, but if there was one thing that she knew about Harry Dresden it was that he wasn't the one who had started the fight.

"He had made contingency plans though, a silacrum of himself that would take his place if he ever died. The silicrum was to make a deal with Bob; release Bob from his curse, return him to mortality in exchange for bringing my uncle back from the dead. Bob went along with it in order to save my life and to make sure that my uncle was destroyed forever. I'm just glad that for Bob, once cursed means forever cursed. He returned to being a ghost after he gave up his life for mine."

"That's how the crushing evidence disappeared from your uncle's corpse?" Kirmani butted into the discussion.

Harry nodded. "The point is; Hrothbert of Bainbridge would never have given up his life for anyone except Winifred. Bob did for me, which fulfills the prophecy."

"And if Maria had been allowed her way, it wouldn't have made a bit of difference." Murphy could hear the growl in Winifred's voice. "She did not wish to acknowledge that she had ever been married to Sergeant Murphy. I'm afraid that included refusing to admit to your existence Constantia."

Murphy shrugged. That wasn't anything she hadn't long ago figured out. "It's Connie or Murphy, not Constantia."

"As you wish," Winifred said.

"So what did you do?" Harry asked. Murphy wanted to know as well. There was no way that Winifred would have let that get in her way.

Winifred smirked. "I had your brother Carlos mail Hrothbert's skull to your father's station."

All three of the mortals laughed at that. "Sneaky," Kirmani said admiringly. "Hey Dresden, there are some more of those weird floating words up ahead."

Chapter Twenty Two

SID KIRMANI

Harry Dresden was a flake, a goofball who thought he could do magic. Magic didn't exist. Sid Kirmani knew this. He also knew that Dresden had the most astounding luck in finding things and helping them close cases. It couldn't have been anything else, or at least that was what he had thought this morning. Now he wasn't so sure. Dresden could have easily set up the glowing light ball that now floated above their heads, but he knew, _he knew_ that the storm drain hadn't been rigged. The skull maybe could have been, but really the ghost woman was far too elaborate for Dresden to have come up with.

Kirmani wasn't sure the guy knew how to tie his own sneakers some days, and forget anything to do with electronics, but the clincher came when Murphy and Winifred the ghost knew each other; _by name_. So he was willing to go along with things for now. He would go back to being in denial later. Then he spotted more of the same type of words floating in the tunnel ahead of them that he and Murphy had seen in Dresden's shop during that missing corpse case and he pointed them out. "I wouldn't follow the girl if I were you," Kirmani read aloud.

"Harry?" Murphy demanded. Kirmani glanced over at Dresden. The guy was not comfortable. Kirmani knew that Dresden would give up whatever was bothering him though. Murphy had that sort of effect on people.

"Well, the good news is that Bob's protecting Anna," Dresden said weakly.

"And the bad news?" Murphy demanded.

"Bob's having fun tormenting her kidnappers and I think that he's having Anna help him," Dresden said in a rush. Murphy glared up at the floating words. Kirmani did not want to be Bob when Murphy caught up with him. Ghost or not, Murphy would tear him apart if he had messed up Anna in any way. "We should be on the look out for traps," Dresden finished.

Murphy growled at the letters out of her reach and marched down the tunnel. Winifred hurried ahead of her to keep her on track and Harry followed them, absentmindedly reaching up to wave his hand through the words. Just as they had done before the words disintegrated into a shower of sparks. Now that he had seen Winifred manifest though, (and yes he did know the proper terminology for ghosts showing up out of the blue) Kirmani thought that the sparks resembled Winifred when she came out of the skull. Shaking his head Kirmani once more brought up the rear.

It wasn't ten feet further down the tunnel when they realized that Dresden was right. The smaller of the two perps who had taken Anna Murphy had been wearing a distinctive bright orange jacket. That jacket was now lying on the floor of the tunnel, covered in some type of animal droppings. "He had better not have let her touch that!" Murphy snapped as she walked around it.

"Ghosts on Bob and Winifred's plane of existence can't physically touch things," Dresden admitted. Murphy shot him such a glare that if she had any talent for this magic stuff, Kirmani was certain that Dresden would have burst into flames. "There are things a lot worse than animal crap down here Murphy. Bob's more concerned about those than he is about keeping Anna clean." True or not, Kirmani knew that the only way Dresden was going to get out of this one was if Anna Murphy escaped without a scratch and a lot of groveling on Dresden's part.

Chapter Twenty Three

HROTHBERT OF BAINBRIDGE

"Look Bob, fireflies!" Anna exclaimed as she pointed out the small flickering lights headed in their direction. "I didn't know that fireflies could live down here."

"I do not know if fireflies can live in this place," Bob said with a disdainful look at the muck on the sides and floor of the tunnel they stood in. "Those however, are fey not fireflies. You should be very careful in your interactions with any of the fey. Say nothing to them. You haven't learned their rules of etiquette as yet. The last thing we wish is to offend them. This type is very small but all are far more powerful than their appearance suggests. Our best bet is to bribe them with food or sweets to perform a simple task, such as pouring those cans over our pursuer's heads."

Bob pointed at two rusty paint cans that were filled with stagnant rainwater, among other things that he didn't wish to examine more closely. He did not mention the outcome of the pranks the Will-O-The-Wisp fey played on mortals. Death by drowning was the most pleasant fate that awaited an unwitting mortal caught by these tiny fey. He would not allow Anna to fall into their clutches. "If they agree, they won't play pranks on you."

"Which is better, food or sweets?" Anna asked as she rummaged through her backpack. "I've got both."

Bob could see that Lieutenant Murphy had thought of the probable leanness of Harry's larder and had packed appropriately. There was more than enough food and snacks to last Anna a couple of days. "Sweets are far better for these fey, although Harry knows a group that is positively addicted to pizza."

"I've got a Snickers bar!" Anna announced proudly and held up the king sized candy bar. "It's my favorite, my mom's too."

Bob nodded, "Perfect." He raised his voice and called down the tunnel, "I would make a bargain with you, Swamp Lords!"

The lights drifted closer until they could see the tiny people inside. "You have nothing to bargain with ghost." The one who spoke looked like a tiny figurine from a 'Lord of the Rings' catalog that Bob had seen once. The kind of reading material he was forced to stoop to from sheer boredom appalled him sometimes.

"No, but my charge does," Bob said as he pointed at Anna's hand. She held up the now bare Snickers bar. Bob could see the fey try to put on a good bargaining face, but the sheer greed of the buzzing group behind him let Bob know that they would gladly take any offer made to them.

The spokesman fey looked at the candy bar and said, "That is not enough for a large bargain, but perhaps we could agree to a small one." Bob thought that the counter would have been much more believable if the fey hadn't been practically drooling. "We fey are not at the beck and call of mortals."

That statement, and the not at all subtle threat it conveyed, was much more convincing. Bob was determined that no harm would come to Anna and answered the threat with a faint sniff. "I would be a poor teacher if I did not instruct my student on giving all fey the proper respect. Even the least among the fey, which you and yours are not, is far too powerful to be trifled with." Bob bowed, careful to give neither too much nor too little deference in the gesture. Anna followed suit awkwardly, careful not to lower the candy in her hand.

"AH!" the fey exclaimed. "That is good. While we enjoy playing with mortals, wizards who show no respect are annoying." While the fey was pouting adorably, Bob remembered that Will-O-The-Wisps often fed on the flesh of their victims, and they did not always wait for the victim to be dead first. That was why the candy was the better choice in bribes. The fey could have flesh to eat at any time they wished. They weren't picky about what they caught and ate. Sweets of any kind were far more difficult for the small creatures to obtain. "Name your bargain ghost."

"There are two mortal men following us. One is very skinny, and the other has visible tribal markings. In return for overturning those paint cans over these men's heads, I offer you this sweet." Anna sort of bobbed her hand with the candy on it.

"Nothing more?" the fey asked with suspicion.

Bob looked affronted. "You are the Swamp Lords. I would never dream of dictating your actions towards mortal men that trespass into your realm. I am asking for your participation in their humiliation. I have no doubt that my student's parents are currently tracking us and will soon find these men. I merely wish for them to be on their knees begging to be taken into custody by the human Wardens by the time they are caught." He paused for a moment and then leaned forward, as if to convey a confidence. He whispered, "You might want to avoid the child's mother. She carries a great deal of Cold Iron on her person. I would be a poor guest in your territory if I did not warn you of the danger."

The fey nodded as though to say 'of course', his attitude very much the lord of the manor. "We agree to your bargain ghost." At that the group swarmed Anna's hand and suddenly the chocolate bar was gone. "Now I suggest that you continue on your way." Bob bowed once more, Anna following suit before ushering her further on down the tunnel. He was glad that he could no longer break into a nervous sweat. Dealing with any of the fey was a chancy thing, but he had managed to steer Anna to safety.

Top of Form

Bottom of Form

Chapter 24

CONNIE MURPHY

The next sign was in a tunnel leading off a junction. It said, "Go on, I dare you." Murphy wasn't sure whether to laugh or fume. On the one hand, nasty practical jokes of the sort that Bob was orchestrating were not things that she wanted Anna to learn. On the other hand, the perps deserved anything that the ghost and Anna could throw at them. She hoped that after setting the slime slide or the crap trap Anna had used the hand sanitizer she had packed in her daughter's backpack. She was well aware of Harry's lack of housekeeping skills.

"Oh no," Harry moaned.

"What?!" Murphy demanded. Then she saw that Winifred was ignoring the marked tunnel and was taking the tunnel on the right hand side. She realized what that meant. "It's another trap isn't it?"

"Yeah, and it looks like our new friends took the bait," Harry said. He sighed and shrugged out of his backpack.

"Harry what are you doing?" Murphy didn't care what happened to the creeps that had taken Anna. They needed to get to Anna first, everything else could wait.

"I have to go and check it out, see if either of them survived," Harry said simply. It was obvious that he really didn't want to go but felt that he had to. It was one of Harry's most annoying traits, and his most attractive, Murphy had to admit. The man couldn't ignore anyone who might be in real trouble.

"Blood trail," Kirmani called out, interrupting what could have been a spectacular argument. "It leads out of there and it's fairly recent. The blood's only slightly tacky." He was panning a small penlight along the tunnel floor.

"Winifred, could you see who the blood came from?" Harry asked.

Kirmani glanced over at Murphy but she just shrugged at him. She didn't have any idea how her new ghost would be able to do anything but then Harry had called Bob his tea expert once before. There had to be someway that the ghosts could interact with things even if they couldn't touch them. Winifred knelt down next to the blood and delicately placed a single finger inside one of the drops of blood. Murphy was startled when Winifred began to transform. The transformation swept over Winifred like a wave, preceded by the same glittering sparkles that had accompanied her first appearance. In just a few seconds a man covered in tattoos knelt where Winifred had been. "Jason Fleck!" both cops exclaimed.

"Murph?" Harry asked, worried.

"He's muscle for Kemerling, nasty piece of work," Murphy growled. She didn't specify which one but the truth was she didn't need to. They both were the sort of scum that wouldn't hesitate to hurt Anna in every way possible just to get back at her mother. Kirmani nodded in agreement.

"Any blood from the other one?" Harry asked. Murphy knew that it was a good idea to know if the other perp had survived and who he was. Fleck had a few 'friends' that would love to help him out, some more than others.

Kirmani scoured the muck with his penlight again and this time found a second blood trail. It was actually larger than the first one but the dark and muck on the tunnel floor had hidden it. Without hesitation Winifred hurried over and once more placed her finger in the blood. This time she appeared to become a skinny young man with greasy long hair and a scraggly beard.

"Joseph Moore," Kirmani identified while Murphy cursed under her breath. Moore looked like any other junkie that could be found of the streets of Chicago and his only redeeming quality right now as far as she was concerned was the fact that he wasn't a pedophile like some of Fleck's boys. Anna was safe from that at least. "He's a heroine addict and one of Fleck's all around errand boys. He'll do almost anything to get enough money for another fix." Kirmani looked over at Harry bleakly and Murphy didn't bother to get angry about it. She knew that Kirmani was just being realistic. If they couldn't get to Anna first, she was going to be in real trouble.

"Let's go," Murphy said. As long as either one of those men were still alive and going after Anna they didn't have time to waste. "We're getting close," but she was fiercely glad that Bob had sent them into a trap that had nearly killed Fleck and Moore both.

New Student 25

HARRY DRESDEN

Murphy was right; we were close, just not close enough. We went through eight more traps before we caught up with Bob and Anna, but then we were the lucky ones. Moore didn't live through the next trap. Not that Bob's trap had killed him, mind you. Bob would not expose Anna to such things, not unless it was a matter of her life or death.

Moore had died because of two reasons, the first of which was because he was a junkie. Personally, I have a lot of sympathy for junkies because I've walked that line myself. All it takes is one single use of the Black for a magic user to become addicted for life, not that they generally live long. I had used the Black twice. The first time was when I had killed my uncle, and accidentally or not, it was no wonder that the Wardens kept a close eye on me. The second was when I had tortured Murphy's body in order to free her from a possessing bully of a spirit. I used to have nightmares about killing my uncle. They had been overshadowed by what I had felt when I used the Black the second time. I truly think that if it hadn't been Murphy's body I had been torturing, if I had been torturing someone else to free her, then I would have been lost to the Black. As it was, I regularly woke up to puke up everything I had eaten the night before when my nightmares made me relive how wonderful it had felt.

Moore didn't have the physical resources to combat the animal that lived in the lair that had been down the tunnel that Bob had turned into his trap. That was the reason that he had sustained so much more damage than Fleck. Fleck had survived it just fine. It was like the difference between being bitten or mauled by a vicious dog. If you were reasonably healthy, and had your wits about you, you were likely to just end up with a few bad bites. If you weren't, well Moore had been lucky he hadn't been killed on the spot.

The second reason that Moore had died was that he hadn't been able to handle any more stress. Winifred had done what I would normally have asked Bob to do, and after placing her hand in the body had announced that Moore had died from a combination of blood loss and stress. He'd had an aneurism.

Some would consider Moore lucky. I was certainly one of them. Fleck had been found by a group of Will-o-the-Wisps, which scattered at the sight of us, or more likely Murphy and Kirmani and their guns made of Cold Iron. Put enough bullets in a fey and they died, immortal or not. From what I had seen, it was bitch of a way to go too. So here was Fleck, down on his hands and knees, literally begging Murphy and Kirmani to take him into custody.

He had been half drowned, and I really didn't want to know where the Swamp Lords had gotten the water to do that. There wasn't enough standing water to drown a rat in here. My all too fertile imagination immediately fed me the image of them pulling water from the muck and pouring it down his throat, making him breathe it. Shuddering I wrenched my focus back to what else had most likely been done to him. There were rat bites that had to be infected already, scratches from the claws of the fey, pulled out hair from his beard and head, and from the wild look in his eyes the Will-o-the-Wisps had done a number on his head as well. They weren't called the Swamp Lords for nothing. They had total mastery in their element.

While Kirmani dealt with having some uniforms come down and deal with Fleck, I was rummaging through my pack. "What are you doing Harry?" Murphy wanted to know. She was itching to get back on the trail.

"I need to leave a parting gift for our friends to thank them for their kindness in leaving this," I motioned at Fleck, who was now being hauled away, "alive for us to deal with. They could have just left us his corpse." I pulled out the pizza that I had stuck in there earlier, and put it up high on a little ledge. They would be able to find it there, and knowing them, they were probably watching us right now.

"Friends?" Kirmani asked warily.

"You don't want to know," I said with a shrug. "You'd probably sleep better not knowing."

Kirmani made a face. "Let's just get going." As Fleck had been hauled away, as well as Moore's body, the rest of us were as eager as he was, and we were soon back on the trail. Did I forget to mention that after meeting up with Fleck, there were seven more traps?

Chapter 26

CONNIE MURPHY

"Harry," I said quietly, "it's impossible to die from both an aneurism and blood loss." I didn't really want to know, but I had to find out what was really going on. Anna's life depended on it.

"No it isn't," he told me, "as long as you're dealing with creatures that can create pools of liquid anywhere." We were both speaking quietly, hoping that we wouldn't be heard, either by Kirmani or anything else. Just then Harry hit the next trap.

I had always known that Harry was one of those people who just kept going until they dropped, in his case that often meant that he was bloody, bruised and often somewhat broken by the time he did. This however, was the first time I had seen him get that way first hand. From the very beginning, Harry had insisted on being the one to follow right behind Aunt Winnie.

After the first two traps, a roller skate that sent him to the ground with a knock to the head and a twisted ankle and then a baby alligator that clamped down onto the twisted ankle, I realized that Harry was setting the traps off on purpose. It wasn't hard for me to understand why. In the years I had known Harry, he had always been the sort of person who did his best to protect people, even me, although he knew I could take care of myself.

Normally I would have objected to someone else taking the risks of setting the traps off, but there were two things that stopped me. The first was that none of these traps were going to be lethal; annoying yes, lethal no. The second was that there weren't just the traps that Anna and Bob had set up in these tunnels. The animal that had shredded Anna's kidnappers and just whatever the hell it was that Harry had placated with the pizza proved that. I did not want to have to tell Anna that anyone had been hurt trying to rescue her. On the other hand, Anna already knew that Harry could get hurt walking across room when he was doing his wizard stuff. I had told her that so she would be expecting him to not be in the best shape.

There were five more traps, each more childish, annoying, and guaranteed to drive an adult completely out of their mind. By the time we had gotten past the last trap, Harry was soaking wet, limping from where he'd twisted both his knee and his ankle, and had what looked like bug bites all over his exposed skin. Those hadn't come from bugs. I didn't know what the things were, but no bug in Chicago was three inches long, flew, and was bright neon in color; all different colors. The damned things had stingers though, and as usual Harry had done something to either attract them or he had shielded us somehow and forgotten to include himself. The man needed to take better care of himself.

The last trap was worthy of something by Wile E Coyote, and had packed a one, two punch. The first part was a slippery spot on the floor of a downward section of tunnel. One step and it was a quick slide down to land hard against the wall of the t-junction at the bottom of the slope. That was where the second part of the trap was set up. Somehow Anna and Bob had made the tunnel wall sticky, like fly trap sticky. Harry had looked like those plastic witch stickers that I saw every October on people's doors, the ones that said 'splat'.

None of that mattered though, when I finally laid eyes on Anna. Anna stood with her back to the tunnel wall. Her denim jacket and jeans were filthy, but I had expected that. None of us were very clean, except for Aunt Winnie. She was wearing her Happy Bunny backpack, and she was holding what looked like a toy wand in her right hand. She was scared to death. Standing in front of her was, I assumed by the way he was protecting her, Bob.

Chapter 27

HARRY DRESDEN

I had never doubted for a second that Bob would do his best to protect Anna. I also knew that there were many things that Bob would not be able to protect her from. That was why I had been in such a hurry once I knew they were down here in the storm drains. It wasn't just the Will-O-The-Wisps and smeakers that hid down here. There were a host of other things that used the storm drain system to hide, such as Third Eye addicted vampires.

One such vampire had Bob and Anna backed against the storm tunnel wall. If it had been able to think clearly Bob might have been able to talk it into leaving them alone. Unfortunately that wasn't the case, although that didn't stop Bob from trying.

"You will not touch her," Bob said, glowering as only he could. He'd had many centuries of practice after all. To get to her, the vampire would have to go through the ghost. I really didn't think that was a good idea. I wasn't concerned for the vampire. It was welcome to experience the sensation that gave me the heebie jeebies whenever I accidentally shared the same physical space with Bob. I also know that when that happened Bob did his best to limit how much of his curse I felt.

I didn't think Bob would do that for scum like this. I just didn't want Anna to see it happen. She didn't need for her partner in mischief, (never crime, not for this proud descendent of police officers) to suddenly become more scary than the monster she faced. "You can't do anything to me ghost," it sneered.

Behind me I could hear the safeties on Murphy and Kirmani's guns being flicked off. I could also feel the temperature in the air around Winifred plunging down towards absolute zero. I knew that Murphy and Kirmani thought that it was human, but the truth was, it wasn't even much of a vampire anymore. Some vampires were decent enough for what they were, Bianca for example, and if you were careful and fully aware of just what you were getting yourself into, they made nice acquaintances and allies, as long as you didn't get too far into debt with them.

Winifred on the other hand, knew exactly what sort of danger Anna was in, or at least what she would be if I wasn't here. "You should be very glad of that because Bob really wasn't the kind of sorcerer you wanted to cross when he was alive," I said as I limped up to stand shoulder to shoulder with Bob. This had the effect of blocking what little space Bob hadn't been able to, (thus hiding the monster from Anna) as well as blocking Bob's sight of who I had brought with me. The last thing we needed right now was for Bob to be anything less than completely in control of himself, not that the vampire was going to be a danger for much longer. "Unfortunately for you, while I'm no where near his league, you just really pissed me off on what was already a really bad day."

It hissed at me, but before it could attack us I conjured up a fireball and threw it. Normally I wouldn't have used a fireball on a vampire, mostly because I tried to stay on the good side of Bianca, remember what I said about them being useful allies as long as you were careful? I didn't have to worry about her this time though. She didn't like Third Eye scum like this anymore than I did. She wouldn't hold its death against me, and its death was quick, if painful.

"Well, that takes care of that," Bob said with a smirk. He turned towards me and his smirk grew a little wider. "I would ask you what took you so long Harry, but it seems a bit obvious."

I turned towards him and glared. "You know, it's a good thing those traps were meant for Anna's kidnappers. As it is, I don't want to be in your proverbial shoes when the ladies get through with you." I know, that was just a bit mean, but in my defense I had just gone through far too many prank style traps and I wasn't lying. I wasn't sure just what Murphy was going to do to Bob for what he did to save Anna, although I wouldn't put it past her to accomplish whatever punishment she set out to deliver. Murphy wasn't happy.

If it was possible, Bob straightened even further. "Lieutenant Murphy?" he asked, twitching at his cuffs, or perhaps he was just trying to cover his shackles. I nodded. Bob took an un-needed breath and peered around me to see who I had brought with me into the storm system. I had been standing with Anna on my right, now I moved to sit down against the tunnel wall next to her feet, keeping my eyes on Bob. There was no way I was going to miss this reunion.

It was everything I could have hoped for. Bob didn't even get a single word out before he realized who was standing there next to Murphy. "Winifred?" he whispered in shock. The look on Winifred's face was one of a woman deeply in love, and didn't care who knew it. She smiled and walked over to take Bob's hands. To his shock, which I could see he couldn't take many more of, she could actually touch him.

"Is she a ghost too?" Anna whispered as she slid down the wall next to me. I could see out of the corner of my eye that she had moved her backpack to her lap, but still held onto the wand she had managed to pick up somewhere. I knew from the traps that Bob had been teaching her apprentice level spells already, not very difficult ones but ones that would help her to set up the traps and teach her the control she would need; the very same control that I still found hard on occasion to maintain.

"It is I, my beloved," Winifred said.

They stood there holding hands, completely wrapped up in each other. "Yeah," I whispered back to Anna as her mother and Kirmani hurried over to make sure she was alright. "They've been apart a very long time." I pulled my own knapsack around to my lap and pulled out the skull that was inside. "This is the skull she stays in. I guess you could say that after so many centuries it belongs to her now."

Anna pulled out the skull she had, while fending off her mother's searching hands. "I'm fine Mom. Did you get Mr. Tattoo and Mr. Skinny?" She then proceeded to give her mother a surpisingly accurate description of both of her kidnappers. I was very impressed. She couldn't have seen either man for more than a couple of minutes. "This is Mr. Dresden's skull. It's where Bob lives. He's a ghost." She pointed at Bob. "He says that if it's ok with you, he can teach me magic the way he taught Mr. Dresden. Can he Mom, please?"

I looked over at Murphy. "You should let them both teach her Murph. It isn't a good idea to let someone with magic go untaught. Things have a tendency to blow up around untaught magic users; like what happened with the car."

Anna squirmed when I mentioned the car. "I didn't mean to do that. I was scared and it just sort of happened." From the uneasy look on her face, the last adult who had encountered her uncontroled magic hadn't reacted well. It was a good thing that Murphy wouldn't have a problem with it. She was used to magic after hanging around with me after the last few years. Anna didn't have anything to worry about.

"Then what's your excuse?" Murphy asked with a laugh. I could see the sheer relief on her face that she had found nothing more wrong with her daughter than a cover of grime. "Don't worry about the car honey. It helped you to get away from…Mr. Tattoo and Mr. Skinny." I could tell that she liked Anna's monikers for the duo.

"I didn't get taught soon enough," I said grimly. "It wasn't my dad's fault. He was too busy trying to keep me out of my uncle's hands to find me a decent teacher. He couldn't teach me because I inherited my abilities from my mom. I'm pretty sure my uncle murdered her too. By the time Bob started teaching me, my abilities had already outstripped my ability to control them. It took Bob a lot of years to teach me what control I have. Sometimes I think that if I hadn't had him as a teacher, I never would have made it."

I knew that Murphy was going to have to absorb that fairly unpleasant piece of information before she could make her decision, so I piped up, "Hey Bob, why don't we get outa here? I'm sure there's lots of nicer places we can take this reunion." Everyone seemed to agree with me and Anna handed over Bob's skull to me.

I in turn, handed Winifred's skull over to Murphy, but instead of taking it she gave it to Anna. "Eldest daughter to eldest daughter means that this is yours now." She took a look at the ghostly lovers. "I don't have a problem with you studying with Bob, but I think that Winifred might want to teach you too. She's been teaching our family for a very long time."

Murphy led Anna over to Bob and Winifred. "I want you to know that I'm grateful that you took care of Anna while the two of you were down here," she told Bob.

Bob bowed. "It was my pleasure Lieutenant. Your daughter is a very delightful child. You should be very proud of her; both her courage and her ability with magic have served her well today."

"I am proud of her," Murphy said. She held Anna against her side with the arm she had slung around Anna's shoulders. "What I'm worried about is her turning into someone like Harry. I don't want her blowing things up all the time." Although she shot me an amused grin, I could tell she was serious. "Were you serious about your offer to teach Anna how to use her magic safely?"

"I would be honored if you would consider me as an instructor, but as you have said, Winifred is more qualified than I and she has taught your family for centuries. My only student has been Harry, and as you pointed out, he's not the most proficient of wizards."

"No," Murphy agreed, "but he's one hell of a good man. He wouldn't have become that without your help." As I happened to fully agree with her, at least as far as Bob's influence went, I kept my mouth shut. I didn't want to think of what I would have become if I had been left alone with my murderous uncle.

"In that case, I would ask that you allow both of us to oversee Miss Anna's training," Bob replied.

"Agreed," she said. Then Murphy leaned in close. "I may not be able to do any magic Bob, but I'm a cop. I figure things out for a living. The last thing you want is for me to be motivated to figure out how to hurt you. No black magic, and you keep her as safe as you possibly can."

"Lieutenant, you have my word," Bob swore.

Murphy nodded, satisfied. "Let's get out of here gang." She led the way back to the nearest exit. I hefted the skull in my hand at Bob as a hint, and both he and Winifred took it. They both dissolved into balls of gold and black sparks that darted into the skull.

I hastily stuffed the skull back into my pack before hurrying after the others. I really didn't want anyone to ask me questions about where the ghosts had gone, even if I was the only one who understood just what was going on. Bob, and I assumed Winifred as well, still retained a great deal of their living urges. It was part of the punishment inflicted on them by the curse. As long as I stayed near Anna, or at least the skull in her backpack, Winifred would not be yanked away from Bob at an inopportune moment.

Back at the station I settled down in a corner to watch Murphy and Kirmani deal with the paperwork. Anna Murphy was alive, unharmed and now knew just what was happening to her. I had spent my first eleven years in a completely mundane world, but at least my father had been able to tell me about my magic and the mother who had gifted it to me. Anna hadn't had any help before today.

Murphy now had the beginnings of the knowledge she would need to help Anna. She had already proved that she wasn't going to back down on that when she threatened Bob, not that I had ever doubted her for a moment. I was already deep into plans for setting up an area for Anna to study at my place.

I doubted that Kirmani would ever change, so my expectations for him were naturally low. It really didn't matter in the long run whether or not he accepted magic was real or not, we were never going to be close friends. As long as we could work together and protect Murphy and Anna, I was content.

As for Bob and Winifred, now that they were reunited I felt that justice had truly been served. Bob had committed the sorts of crimes that did deserve a harsh punishment, but to my way of thinking the Council had gone way too far. To be trapped for eternity serving your enemies was bad, to be able to interact but unable to touch was worse, but to have the skull of the one person that you loved with your entire being be your prison, was simply torture.

The reuniting of Bob with his lady would make their sentence bearable without diminishing their punishment. Now all I had to do was keep them together. Fortunately for me, I think I have a small ally in that. I glanced beside me to see Anna carefully wrapping both skulls in paper and placing them in a cardboard box. Yeah, for the first time I had someone else to count on to help me protect Bob, and now Winifred as well.

The End.


End file.
